The Lion's Jaws
by Thagguy
Summary: A cat mewls and speaks of what cannot be done. A Lion roars and declares what will.
1. Chapter 1

_"O wonder!_  
_How many godly creatures are there here!_  
_How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world,_  
_That has such people in't."_

Atop a tall pine, a golden figure stood balanced on the branches. Though the tree swayed in the wind, the watcher's footing was as sure as if he stood upon the ground.

There was a new scent in the forest. The smell of death was always present, but that was a sweet, pleasant odor. Death in a forest was only part of a cycle, for new life is born and grows of the death of the old. Even when the empty bones of the dead were sent down to the Gravelord's tomb to see new use as Nito's servants, their flesh and souls were first given to the living, so that their deaths would see to the betterment of those left behind.

This was a smell of death that bore no life. This was a death that sat final and cold in the air. This was a death with no promise of a future, a death consisting of nothing but itself. It was like a fire without heat, or light without illumination. It was a thing that should not be. The figure stared out into the forest with the impossible scent.

Before him spread the forest of Oolacile, a vassal city-state of Lordran. Nestled at the base of the mountain Anor Londo stood atop, it was a land of peaceful magic and quiet commerce. Its forests were the source of most of the kingdom's timber, and its ports on the river the gateway from the Mountain of the Sun to the world beyond. It was also a land of mysterious magic; sorcery derived not from the Duke's, but of a different sort- deceptive magic that fooled the senses and the mind, dazzled the eyes of the wicked with the same light that delighted children that gathered around makeshift street stages. The Hidden Kingdom, it was sometimes called, for all the mysteries it held within its tall towers and narrow, winding streets.

Normally, the forest would be patrolled by the massive stone sentinels, and the underbrush tended by animate trees tamed by the magic of the city's sorcerers and its caretaker, the cat-Goddess Alvina. The snip-snip of gardeners at work and the steady, rhythmic pounding of golems tirelessly patrolling the woods, muffled by the soft forest floor, was absent. Now, the forest was quiet. Guardians and gardeners alike had been recalled to defend the outskirts of the city. Already, their absence was beginning to be seen in the new shoots of fast growing plant life that would soon turn the woods into an impassable thicket. Few birds sang, and those that did spoke in short, clipped songs, as if the wildlife itself was suspicious of the calm.

"The Abyss is a plague most foul," said a raspy voice to the figure's side. As he was currently standing on top of the tallest tree in the area, this was somewhat of an oddity. He turned his head, encased in a helm shaped like a golden lion, to look at the speaker, then forward again.

An enormous white-and-grey cat with coarse, scraggly fur and a grinning alligator's mouth sat on his shoulder, its four paws perched confidently on the tip of an ornamental spine with the same casual grace as the golden figure stood on the tree.

"Yes," said the man in a voice that crackled like thunder and boomed like the roar of the lion his helm was sculpted to resemble, "We should have sent more than Artorias and his wolf."

The cat snorted. "So that they could fall to the Abyss as well? Artorias had greater force of will then you, Ornstein, and still he fell to the Dark. Gough does well to cower in that prison, bow rotting in the rain, whittling at his carvings while Oolacile sinks and the Black Dragon flies free."

The figure turned to look at the cat again, this time so quickly that the blood-red tassel on his helmet swung impressively.

"It is not your place to mock the Knights, Alvina."

With a harsh, yowling laugh, the cat turned to smoke and gently floated against the wind to a nearby treetop, where the smoke turned again to fur and flesh. Ornstein had neither felt the cat materialize on his shoulder, nor her leaving it, in the same way the branch she chose as her new perch didn't bend to any weight.

"If that is not my place, then what is? We are guardians, Sir Ornstein. Delusions hold no place for us, for what do we guard without the truth? Offense, this I do not deny for the sake of your pride, Dragonslayer. "

"But you take pleasure in it," Ornstein said.

"Oh, and hear the Captain of the Four Knights whine like a petulant child! You frown at the needle, but it is red blood that flows from the prick, and the lion bristles at the yowling of a cat!"

The Dragonslayer grunted, and stepped off his branch. He plummeted to the ground, and despite his great height-twice that of a normal man-landed with only a slight rustle of disturbed leaves. It was a fall that a human would have counted himself lucky to survive with only shattered legs, but he only adjusted the grip on his spear and gave the surrounding trees a casual glance. He began to walk with a purposeful stride, his spear held upright in gold-wrapped fingers. The cat's fog travelled down from the treetops behind him, and solidified again mid-trot.

"But now there are more pressing matters than your opinions of my men, Gardener."

"Quite," said the cat. "Oolacile is lost. Of that there is no doubt; the blight has spread too far. Most of the city has already fallen into the Abyss. The King is dead, and Princess Dusk captured by what creatures lie in the Deep."

Ornstein said nothing, and continued to walk.

"Perhaps you know not the significance of this," Alvina said, "Princess Dusk can travel the maze of time freely. For her, time be not knotted, but a simple fabric; where others see an impossible snarl, she cuts though to where she may wish."

Ornstein stopped walking. The leather on the palms of his gauntlets creaked as his grip tightened on his spear. Sparks of electricity danced around his spear and between the lion's teeth of his visor.

"This beast has that intelligence?" Ornstein asked, mind swimming with the implications.

The cat shrugged, somehow. "In truth, I know not. It is only circumstantial inferences, but sound they seem."

Though Alvina couldn't see them, Ornstein's eyes hardened in determination. "Then I must succeed where Artorias failed."

Instantly, his vision was filled with a snarling feline. This time, he felt a great weight hang off his shoulders where Alvina had anchored herself, far greater than the feline had any right to weigh.

"You great fool, have you heard nothing? Does the crackle of your lightning fill your ears so that no words penetrate? I witnessed the follow of Artorias' advance into the Abyss and into the Chasm that holds its heart. He never made it to the monster- consumed by shades of Humanity, his Soul poisoned by the Dark of the Abyss. His pendant of silver repelled the beasts that arose in New Londo, but it was a child's trinket to the foulness here. Your light is quick and your soul bright, Dragonslayer, but you fight Dragons. A Dragon does not invade the Soul and body to turn it against the mind; a Dragon does not make you one with it as does the Abyss."

Alvina faded to mist, and reappeared again on the ground, crouching low. Despite the dread disrespect she had shown him, Ornstein made no move against her. He knew it would be pointless to assault the cat. "Thine enemies art not these, Ornstein. If you enter the Abyss, you shall become its slave, more deeply than Artorias. You will not even so make it to where he left the pup."

"I am Captain of the Four Knights. The Spear of the Sun. And you would have me do nothing against this threat?"

For a long time, Alvina stared at the golden-armored Dragonslayer.

"The slayer of the Father of the Abyss cannot be a God or a Giant. His death must come at the hand of one his own descendants. As the Gods fought the Dragons, so must the humans fight the Abyss. What you must do is to avenge your compatriot- finish the death the Abyss left so incomplete."

And with that, Alvina faded into mist and did not return.


	2. Chapter 2

Ornstein watched the mist of the cat thin and fade, and stared at the grass that remained behind it long after all traces were gone.

_Captain_. _Dragonslayer._ _Knight_. What good were these titles? He had fought _Dragons_ at the making of the world. Now he was to sit idly as the Dark tore it asunder from below, like a coyote tearing the belly of an elk?

He gripped his spear tighter. _No._ It would not be.

"A cat mewls and speaks of what cannot be done," he muttered to himself. "A Lion roars and declares what _will."_

He walked through the spot where Alvina vanished. The moss compressed beneath his boot, leaving a massive footprint to mark his passing. He heard a scream.

It was a sound of agony and rage, like a great beast caught in a trap. It was warped, somehow, like an echo through a pipe. It was a howl of a distorted, broken thing; an insane, monstrous it was a voice he knew.

"Artorias…"

Ornstein ran now, toward the sound. His form flowed like molten gold through the forest, a streak of blood red following in the wake of his lion helm.

The forest fell away into a cliff, a gash cut through the world as if by a giant sword. Below, Ornstein could see the bed of the river, dried to a slight creek, and the city of Oolacile.

And beyond that, a yawning chasm. Much of the city had already fallen into it. The palace was nowhere to be seen. Oolacile was once a city of architecture that seemed almost simple, next to the sprawling, ornate splendor of Anor Londo, austere and utilitarian, often the only decoration the vines of ivy covering the walls like a green rash. The true beauty of the buildings of Oolacile was their engineering and their scale, so tall the tips seemed to sharpen to a point as they stretched towards the sun like growing trees. Now it was a ruin. The few buildings that remained had mostly collapsed on one another. A building of apartments had fallen onto the prison.

Though it was still too far to make out people, the steady movement Ornstein had known the city for on his few visits was absent. It was still and silent as the dried river.

Straight ahead of Ornstein was the city's high-walled amphitheater. Despite its position on a hill well outside the city center, its famous high walls had partially collapsed. Purplish-black sludge shot through with dark blue veins, bearing a disturbing resemblance to flesh, despite the color, draped over the ruined stone like discarded garments.

On instinct, he looked to the skies. His heart pounded at the sight; electricity coursed through his veins and down the crossguard of his spear.

Black wings beat powerfully against the air, leaving whirlpools in the clouds as the Dragon flew. A single, cross-shaped eye, pupilless and glowing red like fire, glared from within scales as black and shining like jet. It was a Dragon of great power, whose malice and was so overwhelming his very presence was like a curse and possessing a power of supernatural luck; the forces of the Lord had fought the Black Dragon many times in the war that made the world, and many times had they failed. Those that died perished in black and sickly yellow-green flames that boiled flesh without heat; those that survived lived forever in agony, the slightest touch splitting their skin like peeled fruit.

There were two Dragons that lived free in the word. One was the Duke of Anor Londo; Seath, the Scaleless, who betrayed his kin in envy of their Scales of Immortality and joined the side of Lord Gwyn, and was rewarded handsomely for his efforts.

The other was the Black Dragon Kalameet, with whom Anor Londo had struck a deal: he would be allowed to live in the new world of Fire, provided he bring no harm to God or Man, and not enter Lordran, those lands claimed by the Lord of Sunlight, and Anor Londo would not rise against him. This uneasy truce had lasted for millennia. Was the Dragon here now for the Abyss? Was the Dragon of Calamity drawn to the suffering?

Ornstein growled, the sound echoing in the metal of his helm. He crouched low. Power coursed through his spine and his legs; electricity arched from his armor.

With a deafening boom, the Dragonslayer took off from the ground, shattering trees and stone in his wake. The Dragon saw him, and slowed, hovering in the air. Ornstein sped towards a cliff in front of the Dragon. As he approached, he slowed, and slammed feet-first into the rock face. The stone cracked from the force of the impact. He buried his spear in the stone to the crossguard as if he was sheathing it in soft leather, and hung from the weapon, feet in holds of his own making.

"Kalameet!" he roared to the Dragon, "You break the binds of our accord!"

The Dragon laughed. It was the sound of leaves falling from the trees; the last breath of a dying man. Its speech echoed in Ornstein's head, though it made no sound; the Dragons spoke directly to the mind.

_"There is nothing but death and ruin in this land."_

"No," Ornstein responded, "Oolacile is the land of the Lord-"

"_Your Lord,_" said the Dragon in the voice of an earthquake, "H_as passed to transient Flame that dies and sputters._" The Dragon's single eye erupted in red light. "_All Fires consume themselves and burn to ash, so the World shall return._"

Ornstein's head erupted in agony. A piercing screech of filled his mind, from everywhere and nowhere. For a few moments, Ornstein saw and heard nothing but the noise within his head.

Then it stopped as suddenly as it began. Ornstein blinked the agony from his vision. Kalameet was gone.

Panting, Ornstein looked around for the Dragon. Behind him, the Black Dragon was flying away, beating his powerful wings, unconcerned with the God that had slain hundreds of its kin. The Dragon banked to the side, and disappeared behind the mountain. Ornstein watched it go, and pulled his spear from the cliff. He slid down the rock, until he landed in the forest. One of the automatons that tended the woods, a living tree holding a giant pair of sheers, hurried to him and being rapidly snipping at a bush Ornstein had flattened on his landing, as if it was annoyed with him.

Ornstein stared at where the Dragon had vanished. Then he slowly turned to look in the direction of fallen Oolacile, again hidden behind the trees.

"Is this how the Age of Fire dies, my Lord?" he asked. "Smashed to splinters by the Dark?"

Lord Gwyn, burning in the Kiln, had no answers. Ornstein shook his head.

"If the Dark shall swallow the Light, then I shall hold back the maw as long as I am able."

He stepped again towards the ruins of Oolacile, and the evil that lay within.


End file.
